Modern municipal sewage and industrial waste treatment plants utilize conventional mechanical and biological processes to reclaim wastewater. The conventional method converts a water pollution problem into a solid waste disposal problem. The disposal of microbial sludge solids (e.g., of microbiological or biological nature) resulting from conventional municipal sewage treatment has historically been expensive because of the extremely large volumes of sludge produced and other problems due to the inherent toxicity and potentially bio-hazardous nature of this waste sludge to the environment. This is especially evident in bio-hazard “hot” zones—such as areas of Mexico and areas within the southern United States, and others—where human parasites can be incubated within biological systems and then transmitted to others through land-spreading, irrigation and other methods of disposal of the contaminated microbial sludges. Such extraction and disposal of microbial sludge is expensive and wasteful.
Waste sludges, especially those comprised of and/or mostly composed of bio-solids (microbial-contaminated materials), have long been the most significant problem associated with activated sludge and other aerobic and/or anaerobic wastewater treatment plants. These sludges are difficult and expensive to dry and are difficult and expensive to sterilize/stabilize. These sludges can contain high fractions of volatiles. The decreased availability of landfills and the reduced acceptability of using these sludges as fertilizer/land spread for agricultural purposes have brought about significant cost increases for the disposal. In some areas, microbial sludges are banned altogether from landfills because of the high pollution potential and the presence of active microbial catalysts and solids (VS), and they retain large amounts of water (70% or more before drying).
The decreased availability of landfills and the reduced acceptability of using these sludges as fertilizer/land spread for agricultural purposes have brought about significant cost increases for the disposal. In some areas, microbial sludges are banned altogether from landfills and as land-spread fertilizers because of the high pollution potential, the presence of active microbial catalysts and the potential for these sludges to become vectors for the spread of pathogenic organisms and diseases.
Various techniques have been developed for the purpose of sterilizing, stabilizing or decontaminating aqueous media containing microorganisms such as biological sludges and wastes including:                U.V. sterilizers;        Pressurization/depressurization cyclic sterilization (using air-cap in a pressure vessel or no air-cap but in a pressure vessel);        Sterilization through exposure of material or solution to a super-critical solution;        Gamma irradiation or similar irradiation methods;        Exposure to a vacuum;        Exposure to strong electromagnetic fields;        Sonofication;        Sterilization through chemical exposure to strong acids (lowering pH of total solution to near or below 2 for an extended period of time) or strong alkalis (raising pH of total solution to near or above 12 for and extended period of time);        Sterilization through high ionic strength solutions;        Heat sterilization;        Physical mincing;        Cycling between high and low pressures, no air cap or other air-induction;        Adding pressure to chemical sterilizing mixtures to increase speed of sterilization;        Flashing using heat and/or steam on high solids waste to develop explosive decompression, followed by shearing; and        Ozone, peroxide and other strong oxidizing agents.        
Those techniques are either too expensive for commercial applications, require additional treatment steps, cause additional pollution loads or are ineffective to treat aqueous media containing microorganisms (for example to cause the sterilization of sludges). There is therefore a great need to provide an improved method for treating such aqueous media containing microorganisms.